Doctor with lung cancer raising awareness
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When Lisa Woody, MD, started experiencing unusual back pain, she wasn't sure what it meant.
As medical director of occupational medicine at Backus, she knew the pain wasn't in a typical location and saw her internist. Soon after a CT scan was ordered, which showed masses in the liver, right adrenal gland, and thoracic spine. After going to an oncologist, Dr. Woody learned she had stage 4 lung cancer.
"I was never a smoker, I had no family history or risk factors for this disease," she said.
November is National Lung Cancer Awareness Month. According to Cancer Prevention more than 215,000 cases of lung cancer are diagnosed each year in the U.S., accounting for approximately 13% of all new cancer diagnoses. Deaths from lung cancer - approximately 160,000 annually - account for 28% of all cancer deaths.
Dr. Woody said lung cancer is the No. 1 cancer killer. She said there is a stigma attached to lung cancer, and because it is often deadly, there are few advocates for the disease.
"It is so important to increase awareness and funding for this disease," she said. She said it kills more than twice as many as breast cancer in women, and 20% of women diagnosed with the disease were never smokers. It is often not diagnosed until the later stages because there are no symptoms at the earlier stages.
In September, Dr. Woody participated in The Free to Breathe Cancer Walk in Glastonbury. More than 500 people participated and $48,000 was raised. She spoke at the walk about the importance of increasing awareness and funding for lung cancer research.
Diagnosed in March, Dr. Woody started a chemotherapy regimen that month, which continued every three weeks through August. She has recently been switched to a targeted chemotherapy drug, Tarceva, which is projected to work for about a year to 18 months before the tumors may develop a resistance to it.
Dr. Woody said lung cancer has a 15% overall survival rate over a five-year period, but when diagnosed at stage 4, the survival rate falls to 5% over five years.
"When I was in medical school, because it is an incurable cancer we didn't treat it. Now doctors try to keep the disease stable, to keep it from spreading or increasing, with medication," she said.
Although the Tarceva has given her a terrible, painful acne-like rash, she said this is often a sign the drug is working, so she is hopeful her body will adjust to the side effects and they will lessen.
She has four children, ranging in ages from 14 to 22, and has been married to her husband, Robert McAlister, for eight years. Two of her children are in high school, one is in college and one is married and lives in New York City.
"It is hard for them, but they take their lead from me," she said. "I am living my life, going to work and their activities, and I have asked my family to do so as well. They have been really good about keeping up a normal routine, continuing with school. This disease is likely to take one life, but I don't want it to ruin six."